Dragon and Judge

By Timothy Zahn

Rating: 4 1/4 stars

Reviewed by Noelle

This is book 5 in the Dragonback series. Zahn delivers another rousing adventure which takes us closer to the big finale. Jack, Draycos, Alison and Taneem are still trying their best to find out the secret location of the K'da and Shontine rendezvous, and to find out before the evil Arthur Neverlin does. On a stop on the planet of Semaline, Jack gets snatched by some Golvins who take them back to his canyon to be a Judge-Paladin--a traveling circuit judge to settle disputes. To his surprise, Jack discovers a mystery involving a mine and the murder of the two previous Judge-Paladins--Jack's parents who he thought died in an accident. As Jack unravels the sticky threads in the Golvin's canyon, Alison is also kidnapped--by Colonel Frost and Neverlin when Frost's henchmen find out she broke into a safety deposit box. Frost brings her to the same slave planet Jack and Draycos escaped from before. Alison's task? To open a safe. The safe that holds the rendezvous information, as a matter of fact. Can both captives escape their respective keepers and find a way to back to each other with their new clues? With only about a month left until the K'da are due to arrive, will our team be able to figure out a plan to save them? Fans of this fast-action scifi series will enjoy the additional twists to the plot and be eager for the final installment, Dragon and Liberator (due in May 2008).